Book Review of Tardy Bells and Witches’ Spells by Sarina Dorie
A love letter to every bit of adolescent fantasy that has ever made us dream as children.
I should start by saying this book was not written for me. I’m a middle-aged man who mostly reads and writes military historical novels. I’m not even a Harry Potter fan. I was too old when it came out to appreciate the book or the movie. I only read and saw the first one.
That said, I LOVED Tardy Bells and Witches Spells! It is young adult urban fantasy at its finest. I identified so much with the main character. I remembered what it was like to feel different, the embarrassment and angst I experienced in school. I remember wanting to believe that I was special, that I belonged to a different world that was full of adventure and excitement waiting to claim me. This book filled me with nostalgia with all its references to the Lord of the Rings series, Dungeon & Dragons, The Witch in the Wardrobe, and so many other forms of escape I had from the cruel, mundane world.
I don’t know how I discovered author Sarina Dorie. It might have been on Instagram. I admired her marketing. I liked the cartoonish, clunky, cute, and sassy art style of the covers. I wanted to try one of her books for a while. So I leaped at the opportunity when the books 1-5 box set was on special. I bought it and threw it onto my to-be-read queue. I finally got around to it, and boy was surprised how much I liked it! It was better than I had imagined.
The story is the first-person narrative of Clarissa Lawrence. She’s an awkward kid with red hair and freckles who’s obsessed with the make-believe worlds of Tolkien, Rowling, and the like. But Clarissa’s owl bearing her admission to a wizard school never comes. Her parents tell her that magic doesn’t exist and she must face the challenges of the ordinary world, like the transition between jr. high and high school. But the magical world won’t be denied as it pries its way into her teenage angst of bullies and boyfriends.
Tardy Bells and Witches Spells is a sweet coming-of-age story with ripples of magic running through it. Sarina Dorie constantly teases us with whether magic really exists as it manifests under the surface of the story. The foreshadowing is excellent, drawing you deeper into the narrative. It was full of surprises, mysteries, twists, and turns. Buy it for your teenager, or better yet, read it yourself. It’s great fun!
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